Bridge End

Oregon backers of the CRC think they’ve won the day. They haven’t met Ann Rivers.

ROILED RIVERS: Washington State Sen. Ann Rivers (R-La Center) says she’s faced “tremendous pressure” to support the Columbia River Crossing. She’s turning that pressure back around, rallying the Senate to reject the project and send it back for a redesign. - IMAGE: cameronbrowne.com

Ann Rivers sips her skinny vanilla latte in a Ridgefield,
Wash., coffee shop on a bright Sunday morning, smiling at the new role
she has found herself playing in Northwest politics: the bridge killer.

Rivers, a La Center
Republican, has served in the Washington Legislature for a little more
than two years. She understands power—Rivers has a political consulting
business, running campaigns and lobbying for local schools.

But Rivers, 46, has
quickly found herself the most prominent and perhaps most persuasive
player in Olympia on the proposed $3.4 billion Columbia River Crossing.

She hates the
project, even though she knows some residents of her Clark County
district might benefit from the massive freeway bridge and light-rail.
She knows the CRC has influential backers—business and labor unions, and
that she will feel heatwhen the time comes to stop the project.

Other Clark County
lawmakers have lined up in opposition as well, but Rivers has emerged as
the leader of that opposition, unswayed by arguments that Oregon and
Washington must build this project now.

“It’s almost been
like a timeshare sales pitch: ‘If you don’t buy now, by God, you’ll
never be able to get it at this price!’” Rivers says. “We need some
sanity on this.”

The CRC would replace
the Interstate 5 Bridge between Oregon and Washington, expand nearby
highway interchanges and extend TriMet’s MAX to Vancouver. Backers say
the project is needed to reduce freeway congestion and replace the aging
spans.

The Oregon
Legislature pushed through a $450 million CRC funding measure in just
three weeks, backed by business and labor interests and powerful
Democrats, including House Speaker Tina Kotek (D-Portland) and Gov. John
Kitzhaber.

Two years ago, the
notion that Washington would balk at the CRC while Oregon forged ahead
was unthinkable. The state’s Democrats back the project. And in 2012,
Democrats held a majority of seats in the Senate.

The turning point,
for the CRC and Rivers, came when two Democrats agreed to caucus with
Republicans. That gave GOP senators control and, with it, the ability to
stop the bridge.

Sen. Curtis King
(R-Yakima), co-chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee, says
Rivers’ engaging, conversational style of politics has made her a force
behind putting the CRC on the Senate’s radar.

“She’s a more quiet individual than some of the other legislators,” King says. “She gathers her information andhas the ability to articulate the reasons behind the way she votes or feels.”

Rivers grew up in
Michigan and earned degrees in political science from Central Michigan
University and natural sciences from Lewis-Clark State College in
Lewiston, Idaho. She and her husband, Fred, who works in the pulp and
paper industry, moved to Southwest Washington more than 20 years ago.

Rivers was first
elected to the Washington House in 2010, was appointed to a Senate seat
last year, and won the seat outright in November. She’s campaigned on
traditional GOP themes: shrinking government payrolls and reducing
barriers to business. Above all, though, she’s known for her opposition
to the CRC.

Now Senate majority
whip, Rivers says the project’s costs aren’t worth shaving only a minute
off the rush-hour commute from Portland to Vancouver.

“This is not a
project about congestion relief, not a project about freight mobility,”
Rivers says. “All those things were shells. It’s about light rail.”

Washington Democrats
back the CRC: Gov. Jay Inslee, House leaders and U.S. Sen. Patty Murray.
But the feds won’t commit money—including financing for light
rail—until both states pony up their $450 million share.

Rivers has her own
influential ally in King, the transportation committee co-chairman, who
announced his committee won’t approve the CRC.

King and Rivers
served on an oversight committee on the project. “The deeper we looked,
the more questions we had,” Rivers says. “We would wait and wait and
wait, and never get the information we wanted.”

Unlike Oregon,
Washington has seen cost overruns, poor design and inaccurate tolling
forecasts strike other transportation megaprojects in the state. Among
the most recent: a 37 percent revenue decline on the SR 520 bridge near
Seattle after tolling began in late 2011.

A local legislator
who supports the CRC, Sen. Annette Cleveland (D-Vancouver), says she has
most Senate Democrats on her side—and she needs only two Republican
votes. “I don’t yet feel that it’s dead,” Cleveland says. “I want to
believe.”

But Rivers says she
won’t let the opportunity to kill the CRC slip away. She’s taken no
chances, working her Senate colleagues on the issue and trying to keep
her fellow Republicans together.

“My
shoulders have gotten very broad and strong from being the only one
saying, ‘No, no, no,’” Rivers says. “And now others are beginning to
join me.”